Jux: The Napkin Manuscripts
by Vol
Summary: Oneshots for Vaeru's "Juxtaposition" series, or "Sparkbearer Saga" or what have you ... Evy has seen a bit of their world aboard Metellus. Now it's her turn to show the Autobots hers. Mostly set sometime during the Schism storyline.
1. Everything You Know is Wrong

**Title:** Juxtaposition: Everything you Know is Wrong

**Canon:** G1, "Juxtaposition" AU

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Transformers. HasTak does. I didn't write _"Juxtaposition"_. **Vaeru** did.

**Author's notes:** This is a fanfic for Vaeru's "Juxtaposition", which is a Transformers fanfic itself and arguably one of the best out there. It's here on ff. net. Read it. Seriously.

* * *

**Everything You Know is Wrong

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**

Black is white, up is down and short is long  
And everything you thought was just so important doesn't really matter  
**- Weird Al**, _Everything You Know is Wrong

* * *

_

"Gahh!"

The hot coffee didn't splash near enough to hit her, but Evelyn still jumped instinctively to one side. The coffee in her own mug swirled ominously as a result.

"Are you okay, Miguel?"

"Yeah, yeah, m'fine," the young man muttered, embarrassed, as he tried to right the mug and wipe up the mess with a handful of napkins. "Sorry, prof. You just startled me."

"I'm sorry." By way of apology she started helping to mop up the coffee dripping down the edge of the metal table. It was already puddling on the uneven concrete floor of the base.

"You've been very jumpy," she remarked to Miguel. "Are you feeling alright?"

Miguel blew his dark hair out of his eyes. A former student and one of her longest acquaintances from the university, he was probably the most laid back person she knew (that is, before meeting a certain black and white, hip-hop-loving Autobot).

The answer came out as a tired sigh. "Oh, y'know ..." he tossed the sopping brown napkin wad into the trash. "Just havin' trouble sleepin', I guess. All the big metal footsteps keep wakin' me up. It's no big deal, really."

Evelyn felt concern bubble up. "Yes, it is," she said, taking Miguel's coffee mug and refilling it for him. "If you're having trouble settling in, I want to know. I picked you for this because I thought it would be the chance of a lifetime and you'd love it. If you're having problems ..."

"Hey, don't get me wrong," Miguel waved his newly filled cup in emphasis. "I do love this! I mean, giant alien robots that turn into cars? This is like, _Twilight Zone_ come to life! I couldn't be happier to be here. It just ..."

They both clutched their coffee cups and hunched over instinctively as the red-blur-sometimes-known-as-Sideswipe dashed around a corner and sprinted _over_ them (somehow managing not to step on anything -or anyone- that might have been underfoot), calling out a cheerful, "Hi, Evelyn! Hi, other squishy guy!" before disappearing in the direction of the hanger doors.

"... takes some getting used to," Miguel finished shakily.

Evelyn indulged him with a smile. "Tell me about it. It took me weeks to stop getting dizzy every time I looked at them."

Miguel blew his hair again. "This really is about the craziest thing in the universe, you know?" he waved his arms, indicating something huge. "They're in a whole different world up there. How do you even talk to something that sees you like ... like a living doll?"

Evelyn's eyes crinkled over her cup. "Oh, you'll manage. Want some advice?"

"Sure."

"Be firm."

He goggled. "'Be firm'? To the giant robot — "

"Mech."

"— the giant _mech_ that could step on me, or squish me, or ... or ..."

"Miguel," Evelyn interrupted. "I know it goes against every instinct, but they're not going to hurt you. Trust me."

"It's more than instinct, prof. The whole world's on its head on this one."

"Be firm," she said again. "They'll only see you as something small and helpless if you don't remind them you've got a brain and a will of your own. Not," she added, pausing from taking a sip of coffee, "that I'd advise getting into a shouting match with any of them, but they're on _our _turf here and they know that. If you put your foot down, they'll respect it."

"It's the 'putting the foot down' I really don't want to encourage."

She snorted a laugh. "You'll get the hang of it."

"I'm not so sure."

At that moment, an imposing wall of red and white came around the same corner the red blur had just vacated. Though it was moving at a much slower pace and its appearance had been punctuated by a series of very audible footsteps, Evelyn still had to steady Miguel's arm to keep from repeating the coffee disaster of five minutes prior.

The red and white mech looked down at the two humans with a clearly questioning glance. "He went that way," Evelyn pointed at the direction in which Sideswipe had just exeunted. "He's probably road-side by now." The mech made a noise that sounded like a snort. Evelyn elbowed Miguel in the side.

"Uh, hi ..."

"Ratchet," Evelyn supplied.

"Hey, Ratchet." Miguel actually managed a step forward and a little wave.

The Autobot medic didn't respond, at least not directly. Instead he fixed the two humans with a penetrating glare, the blue light in his optics narrowing and beginning to flicker.

"Wha ... what's he doing?" Miguel whispered nervously to Evelyn.

"Oh, he's scanning us."

"Scanning?"

"You know, temperature, blood pressure, internal systems and organ function ... right down to what we had for breakfast, and probably the molecular composition of the coffee too," she smiled up at the medic. "Isn't that right?"

Ratchet's optics dilated back. "Do you," he said, "have any idea what that substance is composed of?"

Evelyn took a long, slow sip of coffee, taking the time to savour the taste of sugar and flavoured creamer. "Yep," she said finally, continuing to smile.

They stared at each other for a few potent seconds, before the medic let out another snort, turned on his heel and stalked back the way he came. Evelyn gave a little laugh and took another, more modest drink.

"He was pretty disappointed to find most of our 'organic fuel' isn't as healthy as he assumed it should be," she said fondly. "He'd have us all living off of Wheeljack's nutritional mattress foam if I gave him an inch."

Miguel looked like was trying to decide what healthy mattress foam might taste like. "That was ... being firm?"

"Not so hard, was it?" she winked.

"Sure. I'll just forget everything I thought I knew about giant alien robots."

"That would be a good start."

* * *

**End "Everything You Know is Wrong"

* * *

**

_I noticed I've also adopted the way Vaeru formats her stories and chapters. I like it. It's nice._


	2. Lights and Sirens

**Title:** Juxtaposition: Everything you Know is Wrong

**Canon:** G1, "Juxtaposition" AU

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Transformers. HasTak does. I didn't write _"Juxtaposition"_. **Vaeru** did.

**Author's notes: **I did it again. Only this time, I'm sitting in an open-air dorm in the middle of South Amman. Oh well. Once again. Prezzy for Vaeru.

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**Lights and Sirens

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**

"Hide? I drive a giant red and white van with flashing lights and a siren. What are you, stupid?"**  
- Monte Parker **_Third Watch

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_

A light sheet of rain swept over the hood of the sleek silver and black Porsche as it rolled through the warehouse door, sending waves of water cascading from its tires. As the door slid down behind it, Evelyn was already exiting the driver-side door. She was halfway out when she had to grab frantically for the roof of the car to to keep from landing ass-first on the concrete floor, the reason being that said oil-slicked floor had decided to vibrate horribly just as she put her foot down.

"Did you get it? Did you? Did you?"

Clinging to Jazz's roof, one leg still in the car and the other splayed out in a less than dignified way, the small woman glared up at the eager mech who crouched over her, looking so much like the world's largest, reddest and most robotic golden retriever.

"Christ, Sideswipe!" Evelyn swore, and bit her tongue. The mantra of _"Mama would kill me"_ had long ago begun to lose its effect.

The red mech was unfortunately also immune. "Did you get it?" he asked again impatiently.

The brown-haired woman heaved a long sigh. "Yes," she said through her teeth. "Take it, with my blessings." She fished into the mesh bag in the Porsche's backseat and held out the rectangle of white metal, which was deftly plucked from her hand.

"'SSWIPE1?'" Sideswipe turned the tiny license plate in his fingers, eagerness replaced by crushing disappointment. "Are you kidding me? Why didn't you get the whole thing?"

"Wouldn't fit," Evelyn grunted, tugging at the bag, which had caught on the seat belt. "It can only be seven digits long."

"Why?"

"Because that's the law."

"I don't like it. It sounds like ..."

"_Don't_ even finish that sentence."

The robot ignored her, flipping onto Side B of his ADD coin. "Where's Sunny's? I wanna see." His very large hand shoved Evelyn out of the way (who nearly fell on her behind again), and reached for the mesh bag.

"Hey!" A second metallic voice rang out. "Don't be puttin' your hands in ta some other mech's interior, thank y'very much!"

The voice was ignored and the mesh bag tugged out of Jazz's backseat. The latter wasted no further time transforming and giving Sideswipe a dirty look, which was also ignored.

"'SUNSHN1?'" Sideswipe chortled. He waved a second plate toward his yellow twin, who was sitting in a corner of the warehouse, scratching something onto one of the walls and pretending to ignore everyone. "Sunny! Hey Sunny, check it out!"

"No," was the automatic response.

Sideswipe flipped through the plates like a deck of cards. "'RATCHET' ... boring, 'MIRAGE' ... boring , 'WHLJCK1' ... boring ... 'BABYBLU' ... (_snicker_)... 'HNDDOG1'?" He looked at Evelyn incredulously.

She shrugged. "Jazz helped think them up."

"Hey Jazz, let's see yours."

The black and white mech turned and even did a little pose, showing Sideswipe his back bumper and the license plate that read "JZZYBOT".

Sideswipe stared. "I take it back," he said. "Yours is worse."

"You don't like it?" Jazz asked.

Evelyn snorted, picking her way across the floor to try and reclaim the bag of government-issued license plates from the red Lamborghini. "At least he chose an alt-mode that is _slightly_ less conspicuous," she pointed out. "Emphasis on _slightly_."

"What can I say?" Jazz leaned against a support strut. "I liked what I saw. Speaking o' which ... Prowl!"

Evelyn looked up as the second black and white mech joined them from parts of the warehouse unknown. "Hello Prowl. Your panels have become ... 'doorwings'? It looks nice."

"Thank you, Evelyn. I take it your errand was successful."

"Er ... yes. Sideswipe ..."

Prowl's glance shifted to the red mech still crouched on the floor, who to Evelyn's surprise surrendered the stack of license plates back to her without a fuss. Except for one.

"Here you go ... 'PROWLER'," he snickered, dangling the last plate from his fingers.

Evelyn was quite sure she'd never seen _that_ look on the tactician's face before. Jazz was leaning on the strut, trying very hard not to collapse into his own fit of giggles. She looked guiltily up at Prowl. "I can change it, if you want."

Prowl's expression schooled back into neutral. "That won't be necessary, Evelyn," he said calmly, plucking the plate from Sideswipe's fingers. "Thank you for all your efforts on our behalf." He nodded to her and, blatantly ignoring Jazz, turned to leave again.

"Wait," Evelyn stopped him. He turned back to her, and she made a spinning motion with her fingers. "Turn around," she clarified. Patiently, Prowl did as she asked.

"Your back," the human accused. "What is that on your back?"

"I believe you called them 'doorwings'."

"Not those," Evelyn pointed, her voice rising in tempo. "_Those!_"

He looked at her over his shoulder, and she swore if he had eyebrows he would have quirked one. "You will have to be more specific."

"On your back! Between your wings!" Her finger shook. "You have _siren lights_ on your back!"

Jazz's giggling became audible. Prowl looked infuriatingly confused. "I'm afraid I do not understand."

"Lights! Sirens! On your back!" she shrilled. "What are they doing there?"

"They were present on the vehicle I scanned."

"You told me you picked a Datsun Fairlady Z!" Evelyn accused. "I registered you as a Datsun Fairlady!"

"It _is_ a Datsun," Prowl told her, in a tone that was _almost_ irritated. "I looked up the model's designation myself, as I did with the alt-modes chosen by each of us. What is your concern?""

Evelyn's hands fisted at her sides, fingers digging into the metal plates she still held. "It. Is. A. _Police. Car._"

"Is this problematic?"

She gaped. "Yes! Yes, this is _very_ problematic! I can't have a police car driving around with a license plate registered in my name! It's a felony to impersonate law enforcement! Did you also happen to look up things like _'civil court' _or _'jail time'_, or maybe _'don't drop the soap'_?"

Jazz burst out laughing so hard he slid to the floor, his vocalizer wheezing with static. Sideswipe looked pleased that for once, Evelyn's famed verbal outrage was not directed at him.

Prowl ignored both of them. His optics flickered for a few moments, accessing data from who knew where, before he turned back to Evelyn with a look of chagrin that actually seemed genuine.

"I apologize. I have made an error," he said seriously. "I will attempt to change my alt-mode as soon as we have the necessary energy reserves at our disposal."

Evelyn schooled her features back into something like calm. "Okay," she said, taking a deep breath. "Alright, that's fine. I guess it'll probably be okay for now. Just keep a low profile until then. Vehicles with lights and sirens attract a lot of attention."

Prowl nodded. "Understood."

Crisis averted, Evelyn felt suddenly guilty at her outburst. "It could be worse," she conceded. "You could have picked a firetruck, or a ..."

The pulleys overhead grated to life as the warehouse door was activated from outside. A large red and white van pulled through, spinning a little on the wet concrete. The shrill wail of a siren cut off as the vehicle's familiar curves twisted and folded in on themselves, leaving a pair of red crosses emblazoned on the medic's shoulders and distinctive backwards lettering on his chest.

"Primus save me from this planet's ridiculous driving customs!" Ratchet snapped. "At least turning on that noise got them to move out of the way." His optics went to Prowl, then to Jazz on the floor, and finally down to Evelyn doing her best fish impersonation at his feet. "What," he said tersely, "are you looking at?"

Without a word, Evelyn threw her hands up and turned on her heel. License plates clattered to the concrete floor behind her as she stalked off to the back of the warehouse, muttering words under her breath that Mama would not only have killed her for saying, but would have had her corpse buried with a bar of soap in its mouth.

Jazz dissolved into quiet snickers again, joined by a less discrete Sideswipe. Sunstreaker had abandoned his antisocial pretence to sneer openly at the whole room. Only Prowl kept his composure. He bent smoothly to retrieve one of the plates where it had fallen and handed it to the medic.

"Lights and sirens," he told him, "are not advisable."

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**End "Lights and Sirens"

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**

_A/N: "Jazzybot" is my iPod's name.  
_


	3. Dandelions

**Title:** Juxtaposition: Dandelions

**Canon:** G1, "Juxtaposition" AU

**Description**: Evelyn spends some quality time with Hound and some flowers. Probably set between _Juxtaposition_ and _Schism_. Sheer fluff ... literally.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Transformers. HasTak does. I didn't write _"Juxtaposition"_. **Vaeru** did.

**Author's notes: **It's official: I'm a Jux groupie. Time to get the T-shirt.

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**Dandelions

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**

_To see a world in a grain of sand,  
And a Heaven in a wild flower_**  
- William Blake**, Auguries of Innocence

* * *

"What about the yellow-coloured ones? What are they called?"

Evelyn couldn't help but smile, even as she tried to summon a little more 'professor' patience. "Those are also ash trees. They turn yellow in the fall, just like the beech."

She spread her palms on the cool grass. Her parka, yellow like the dandelions and spread on the ground beneath her, protected her backside from the early morning frost that was fast fading with the sunrise. Living with her parents on the farm until she could get a new apartment, she was forced to keep their hours and that meant being awake at the crack of dawn. She had taken the opportunity to tackle the agoraphobia that living aboard Metellus for so many months had left her with. Sometimes that meant taking an early drive with Jazz or Bluestreak out into the countryside, but lately it had begun to include short morning walks with Hound in the nearby tree-sheltered meadows around the farm. The green Autobot-turned-military-Jeep had been more than happy to oblige. He stood beside her in the field, quiet clicking noises indicating he was taking yet more holoforms.

"Why do they do that?" he asked. "Turn yellow, I mean."

"Because they're deciduous. The leaves fall in the winter and grow back in the spring."

"But those others are still green."

"Those are conifers. They keep their needles all year round."

"What's the difference?"

"Er ..."

The barrage of questions of all things green and naturey stretched her knowledge of the subject to the brink, but it was nothing new. Hound, apparently, had always had a fascination for organic planets, but nothing seemed to have prepared him for what he would find on her humble home world. The sheer inundation of organic life Earth had to offer quickly turned a fascination into an obsession. He had taken particular delight in capturing holoforms of tree after tree and expounding on the uniqueness of each and every one until Mirage, composed, soft-spoken, mild-mannered Mirage, had actually _snapped_ at the tracker ("No, I don't want to see another tree, Hound. There are thousands of trees here and they are _all the same!_") before vanishing and staying vanished for some time, either from embarrassment or to preserve his own sanity.

Hound had since found a more receptive ear in Evelyn, who was happy enough to be back home that she didn't mind early morning reflections on the hows and whys of its natural beauty. It was also forcing her to do preparatory research for their conversations, which gave her something to focus on besides reclaiming the tatters of her former life.

"Conifer needles are strong enough to withstand cold temperatures," she answered the Jeep. "Deciduous leaves are too fragile. The cold kills them."

"It kills the whole tree?" Hound looked alarmed.

"No, just the leaf. The tree just ... takes a break until the leaves can grow back." _Kind of like me_.

Hound's systems whirred, processing this new information. Evelyn wondered that he didn't just remotely access the information from the internet. All of the Autobots seemed to have built in sensors that could easily have picked up a wireless connection even from as far away as her parents' house. She suspected Hound preferred the dynamic of face-to-face learning. As a teacher, she deeply appreciated him for it.

While the green mech sat in silent reflection of nature and its wonders, Evelyn absently toyed with the dandelion stalks near her hand. Even so late in the year, yellow flowers were still blooming amidst the field of fluffy white cottonballs. _Nothing can keep a dandelion down_, she thought ruefully. _They'll just pop up and grow anywhere, anytime._ Plucking one of the stalks, she did something she hadn't in years and blew on the white tufts, sending them off into the air.

Hound's engine gave a short rev which faded into a soft, mournful puttering. She looked up to see a look of pitiful wounded surprise on his metal face.

"What did you do that for?" His voice made her feel she had just kicked a puppy.

"Do what?" she asked, confused and alarmed.

"You killed it. Why did you do that?"

She looked down at the dandelion stem in her hand and understood. "Oh, it's alright. It was already dying."

His faceplates scrunched in a such a way to make her wonder if he'd been taking lessons from Bluestreak. "How does that make it alright?"

Tossing the stem aside, she plucked another white fluffball and held it out. "This part of the plant has to die," she explained with a patient smile. "It starts out yellow," she gestured to the dandelions blooming nearby, "but eventually, it turns white like this and when it dies, all of these ..." she broke the head open and let the seeds spill onto her palm. "All these float away and land on the ground, and they become new dandelions. I'm just helping them along." She blew on her palm.

Hound bent down on his knees with a creak of cables and gears, peering intently at the small brown seeds as they floated by on their little white parachutes. "These ... become new flowers?"

"Yep."

"And those flowers turn white and fall apart too?"

"You bet."

"And that's why there are so many of them here?"

"Yes, that's right."

The Jeep's systems began to whir thoughtfully again as he scanned the field around them, where far more white dandelions than yellow swayed in the breeze. Evelyn barely had time to yelp when the Autobot opened all his vents at once and expelled a massive gust of air, engulfing them both in a cloud of swirling white fluff.

* * *

Evan Hughes paused, newspaper in hand and cup of black coffee half raised to his mouth, as his youngest daughter entered the house through the back kitchen door.

"Have a nice walk, Evy?" he asked, setting the cup down.

"Hmm?" she responded, a little dreamily. "Oh. Oh yes, it was good. Very relaxing."

The folded newspaper followed the cup. "Little windy out today?"

"Yes, a little bit." The dreaminess was matched by her face, an expression of the kind of happy exhaustion that comes from a good, long, hearty laugh. "I'm going to go change."

"Breakfast's on the stove, if you want it."

"Thanks, Dad." She kissed her father on the cheek and headed for her bedroom, humming tunelessly under her breath.

Evan Hughes only shook his head, sipped his coffee and opened the paper again. Since her miraculous reappearance into their world, his youngest had assumed a secretive, mysterious quality that she seemed mostly unaware of. Perhaps later she might enlighten him as to how she had come to be positively _baptized_ in dandelion fluff, but somehow, he didn't think to get his hopes up.

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**End "Dandelions"

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**

_**A/N:** I love dandelions. They are one of those beautiful things in life that are absolutely free._


	4. Brink

**Title:** Juxtaposition: Brink

**Canon:** G1, "Juxtaposition" AU

**Description**: "Some memories, she supposed, were forever scarring." Evelyn and Sideswipe have a 'moment'.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Transformers. HasTak does. I didn't write _"Juxtaposition"_. **Vaeru** did.

**Author's notes: **Sorry this one is short. I'm working on another one of these that is much longer, and this just popped up in the meantime. I should mention that these snippets jump around in no particular order, either, but that should be fairly obvious.

Speaking of meantime, **Vaeru** has begun _"Schism"_ at long last! I'm psyched, guys. Are you psyched? I am _so_ psyched.

* * *

**Brink

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**

_Take me to the edge so I can fall apart_  
'_Cuz there's only one way to mend a broken heart._**  
- Wailin' Jennys,**_ Beautiful Dawn

* * *

_

She was finally adjusted.

The realization came to her as she sat on a giant, discarded tractor tire in the the Autobots' warehouse-turned-secret-base, going through a stack of forms Prowl had printed off human-size for her and unwrapping the sandwich she had grabbed from the "refrigeration unit" Wheeljack had installed and Jazz had lovingly (and mysteriously) filled with all Good Things For Evelyn to Eat (That Won't Make Her Toss Her Cookies).

The unexpected epiphany occurred when Sideswipe walked by humming the Oscar Meyer Wiener Song and she hadn't even bothered to glance up in annoyance. And that's when it hit her: somehow, here in a decrepit building that smelled of oil and gasoline and things she'd rather not think about, occupied by giant sentient transforming robots with a thing for irritating commercial jingles, she had done the thing that had eluded her for her entire year aboard Metellus.

She had _settled_.

It was a single moment of clarity, followed by the barest twitch of depression. _So this is normal now. Huh._

_ Wonder what the catch is?_

With that thought, she proceeded to ignore her treacherous sense of pessimism and went back to her papers. Prowl had been acting as her unofficial agent in the job-search market, finding freelance work suited to her skills as a linguist and setting up a safe online contact base that could be easily monitored. Which meant that soon she might even have enough steady work to get an apartment of her own again, which meant she could move out of her parents' house, and with that her life ought to reach a more recognizable level of stability.

She smiled as she felt a weight dissolve from between her shoulders. All the ups and downs and roller-coaster pitfalls of the past year and a half were finally levelling out into something manageable, and the tight knot that had taken up permanent residence in the pit of her stomach had vanished sometime without her noticing. For all intents and purposes, it seemed that she was _dealing_.

"Are you going to eat that?"

She looked up. "Eh?"

Instead of passing by on his way to annoy someone else, Sideswipe had stopped to ponder the no-doubt curious expression on her face, the more typical result of one who has just left Liminality behind for something a little more stable.

"_That_," he pointed, and she realized she'd been holding the half-unwrapped sandwich up to her mouth without actually moving to take a bite. "Are you going to eat it? Is something wrong with it?" The red Autobot bent at the waist and scrunched his metal face at her. "Is there something wrong with _you?_ You look funny ..." he looked suddenly alarmed and backed up a step. "You're not gonna to purge your tanks again, are you?"

Her stomach had long since stopped acting up at every bite of normal food, but she supposed some memories were forever scarring. Biting back a snort at his generous estimation of her range, she rolled her eyes. "No, Sideswipe. You're in the clear."

"Oh. Okay then."

She moved to take a bite, and stopped. Sideswipe was still peering down at her lunch as though at some particularly fascinating dead bug. She lowered the sandwich.

"Yes?"

"What _is_ that?"

She frowned. Asking her what her "fuel" was made of had been a short-lived practice that had ended not long after the first trip through a fast-food Drive-Thru. She looked down at her sandwich, realizing she hadn't even bothered to see what she'd grabbed to eat.

Something vegetarian on whole-wheat bread, a sad little crumple of lettuce wilted over ... a generous heap of diced tomatoes slathered in mayonnaise.

Her heartbeat ticked to a slow crawl. Somewhere in the distance, she swore she heard a shoe drop.

Sideswipe's face was a mix of apprehension and awe. "It looks ... _gross_."

Though he made a valiant effort, the red Lamborghini was unable to convince Prowl he had no idea why Evelyn had suddenly burst into tears.

* * *

**End "Brink"

* * *

**

_**Liminality:** a psychological, neurological, or metaphysical subjective state, conscious or unconscious, of being on the "threshold" of or between two different existential planes. [Wikipedia]_


End file.
